Media has anti-Muslim bias, claims report

The portrayal of Arab and Muslim people in the western media is "typically stereotypical and negative", according to a new study of perceptions of Islam.

The report, commissioned by the Kuwaiti government and based on a surveys and interviews with media experts, claims that terrorism, anti-Americanism and the Iraq occupation dominate TV news coverage of the Middle East.

"In the past 30 years of thousands of TV show series, there have been less than 10 characters who have been Arab-Americans," the report claims.

"In print stereotypes are not so obvious, except in cartoon caricatures, but they still occur and anti-Muslim bias is more insidious. The terms Islamic or Muslim are linked to extremism, militant, jihads, as if they belonged together inextricably and naturally (Muslim extremist, Islamic terror, Islamic war, Muslim time bomb).

"In many cases, the press talks and writes about Muslims in ways that would not be acceptable if the reference were to Jewish, black or fundamentalist Christians."

The report says the portrayal of Islam is improving in "certain prestigious news organisations" but that TV news continues to be dominated by coverage of terrorist attacks and hostage images "to shock and engage jaded viewers".

"Western media organisations must see normal Muslims in everyday life, as professionals, educators, parents, community leaders and participants," it adds.

The study claims that TV news and documentaries have the strongest influence on people's views of Islam, followed by newspaper coverage.

Of the 2,420 people interviewed in the US and western Europe, nearly half said TV documentaries had a strong or very strong influence on their views of Arab Muslims. For television news, the figure was 41%, while 36% of respondents said the same about newspaper coverage.

Around 37% of respondents said they had very limited exposure to news and information about Islam, while nearly three-quarters said the media depicts Arab Muslims and Islam accurately only half the time.

The study was unveiled at the NewsXchange conference in Amsterdam last week.

"The image of Islam has been hijacked by extremists and it is time to take it back," Chris Yalounis, one of the authors of the report, told the conference.